


Comme Vous Désirez

by newisalwaysbetter



Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: Attempted Sexual Assault, F/M, Fake Marriage, Flynn rescues, Gratuitous French, Hurt/Comfort, Pov Lucy, Probably Historically Inaccurate, Protectiveness, Set s2+, lucywhump, sex mention, to escape such
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:14:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24575902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newisalwaysbetter/pseuds/newisalwaysbetter
Summary: A trip to 1788 France doesn't go as planned.(Prompt: "Get your hands off my wife.")
Relationships: Garcia Flynn/Lucy Preston
Comments: 2
Kudos: 54





	Comme Vous Désirez

They get few luxuries on their excursions, so even if the mission hadn’t required it, Lucy would have insisted that their trip to 1788 Paris include a visit to one of the court’s famous parties. 

Wyatt protests as much as in Germany, but they can’t risk standing out, so as the only two francophones among them, Lucy and Flynn submit to several pounds of face paint and period costuming. Flynn spends the whole process grumbling about the excesses of the bourgeoisie like he’s a cast member in _Les Mis_. 

Still, once they arrive, the thousand little exhaustions of their current lives are momentarily forgotten. Despite her pride as a professional historian, Lucy has been disappointed before by historical reality, but the court is everything she’s read about, and more: glittering, decadent, comical, corrupt. 

Elaborate masks turn to face them as they enter the ballroom. The unfriendly eyes behind them make Lucy shiver–betrayal has made her wary of any false face–but it’s comforting, and natural as breathing, to slip her arm into Flynn’s and let him hold her up. 

“All right?” He mutters into her temple.

Lucy doesn’t even know how to _begin_ to answer that, but Flynn knows this is hardly the time to discuss it anyway, so instead she presses up on tiptoe to murmur into his ear the details of each historical personage they pass. Flynn has somehow managed to procure a cane–ideal as an improvised weapon and, Lucy knows, for dealing with his well-hidden limp–but he walks favoring the side with her on it. Although his head is ducked to listen, Lucy thinks Flynn must hardly be hearing her–he’s busy scanning the room, avoiding her electric gaze–until a particularly juicy bit of gossip earns a gentle chuckle near her ear.

He steers her to the perimeter of the ballroom, where they pass several curtains fluttering in front of hidden balconies. Lucy thinks she has a sense of what goes on in these recessed places, and from the way Flynn is studiously ignoring them, so does he. Flynn also stands a few inches further from her, now, perhaps because they’re less observed and therefore their familiar husband-and-wife routine less necessary. Between the cold air and the whispered sighs of lovers, it’s an awkward reminder of how the distance between them yawns like an open wound.

Lucy is so distracted that she hardly thinks of how it sounds when she brings them to a stop in front of an empty balcony with a decent view of the hall and breathes, “Let’s stop here.”

Under his makeup, she thinks she sees Flynn go white.

He looks as though he’s considering something momentarily, and then his eyes go soft and he whispers, “ _Lucy,_ ” although that’s not her name, not here, not now.

“Let’s split up,” she blurts out suddenly. She’s not sure why. Maybe because she knows she’s all too weak these days; because she knows what she’d say, if he asked.

It comes out too loud, and Flynn shushes her gently with a finger to his lips. Lucy nods, blushing furiously, and Flynn’s eyes twinkle with a wistful smile. 

He leans in close enough that his breath ghosts across her face, so that he can promise, “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Lucy watches him go ( _damn him_ ), and in so doing takes her eyes off the hall behind her for just a moment. Unfortunately, that’s all the time it takes for a strange hand to descend on her shoulder.

“Je vous ai surveillé.” _I have been watching you._

The words send a chill down her spine, but when she whirls, Lucy finds a young Frenchman she doesn’t recognize, standing far too close and looking far past tipsy. The stranger leers in a way she doesn’t like, and worse, Lucy realizes, the niche that she’s chosen to survey the party hides them thoroughly from view. Panic stirs in her gut.

“Monsieur.” Although it grinds her teeth to do so, Lucy puts on the plastic smile she’s perfected in countless tenure meetings and purrs, “Vous etes trop effronté.” _You are too forward, sir._

 _No good._ The man slurs as he closes in, so Lucy can’t make out every word, but those she does send a sharp spike of panic through her. Although it’s been a while since she studied eighteenth-century French manners, Lucy’s fairly certain that she’s currently on the receiving end of the classic speech _C’mon, Baby, Don’t Be Like That_.

He’s got one arm around her now, his breath in her face, but she still has to consider whether the risk of blowing their cover is too great to fight back or yell for Flynn so she bites her tongue and his hand slides lower, _god, no–_

“Enlève tes mains de ma femme,” a cold voice enunciates. _Get your hands off my wife._

The man brays as he’s ripped from her, and Lucy gasps at the rush of cold air, moments before it’s replaced by the warmth of Flynn’s body sliding between them. With Lucy safely behind him, Flynn grips the man by the scruff and snarls something vicious and French and almost certainly anachronistic, but in this moment Lucy can’t bring herself to care. Her gloved hand finds Flynn’s and squeezes hard.

After her attacker has scampered off, Flynn tactfully keeps watch while she puts her dress back in order. Still, her distress must show on her face, because when he turns to her, his brow furrows. “Who was _that?_ ”

“No one important.” Lucy can’t look at him. Her face is red, she can feel it, and the embarrassment of having had Flynn see her so _weak_ makes her want to scream. She huffs a wet breath. Flynn had clearly understood the situation, and she knows she bears no responsibility for it, so why does being seen that way bother her so much? 

His uncertainty still hovers in the air. “I’m fine,” Lucy mutters, because that phrase has long since come to mean _I’ll deal with it later_. Possibly never, if she dies first.

Flynn shifts his weight from foot to foot, his eyes on the ground. “Sorry to interfere. I thought you seemed…distressed. I apologize if I misread the situation; we all have our unpleasant tactics, and I had no right to–”

“What? No.” A shaky laugh breaks free from her. “Flynn, you understood that situation completely. I am _glad_ you pulled him off me. Honestly, the more things change…” she mutters.

Flynn nods, considering. “I see.” Then, with more confidence: “In that case, I’m sorry: I shouldn’t have left you alone for so long. How are you feeling?”

Had a man assumed she needed his protection back at the university, Lucy would have had his throat in her teeth, but this is not the manicured lawns of California. Much as she loves the past, it can be a wasteland. Sometimes it seems their respective roles are all that keep them from losing themselves completely. This all is understood between them, just as it is that Lucy has chosen to make this man her shield.

Without her asking, Flynn offers her his arm. It’s only then that Lucy realizes how hard she’s shaking.

“We should go,” Flynn says gently, but Lucy hesitates. As she’s found nothing, tonight will be a total waste of time if they leave. If she let’s what’s happened affect her enough to insist upon it.

Flynn swallows, eyes on the ground, before he speaks. “Jefferson’s not here tonight, if that’s what you’re worried about. We’ll find him tomorrow, I promise.” 

He knows her all too well, and what makes her heart turn over is that there’s no journal to betray her in this.

When she takes Flynn’s arm, Lucy feels the weight of his unsaid words in its steadiness under her. He clears his throat. “We don’t have to talk about–that. If you don’t want to.”

“Maybe later.” When she squeezes Flynn’s hand, his wedding ring–hers, here–is hard and sure under her fingers. “Don’t tell the others about this.”

As they emerge into the light of the dance, Flynn leans just close enough to breathe into her ear, “Comme vous désirez, madame.”

_As you wish._


End file.
